Ivana Zittová

* 1967

  • “In winter… there are possibilities. But I didn't go there in my life because you catch everything there. All kinds of bugs you do not know, you catch those in there. And you have to watch everything. Sleep on the mobile, sleep on your ID card. There is so much stealing.” - “Were?” - “Everywhere. These shelters, there is mostly stealing there. I might have been working, but I was going to work from under the bridge, because we couldn't get a hostel, so by 9 January 2018 I was already going to work, but I was going from under the bridge. We tried the free 'A' in Maniny once, for a short period, the Salvation Army - and no, I wouldn't have gone back in my life, I could not sleep there.” – „And what have you done over winter, as you were out in the street for many years?“ - “Normally in the woods, I made a fire, sometimes we found tents, so I sewed it, I like embroidery. Anything was possible.” - “You had a sleeping bag, a baggage…?” - “It was enough.”

  • “We had mandatory reports, it was mandatory. And we already knew it, we already did care at all. No walks, nothing, we just waited. He announced it [Vaclav Havel declared an amnesty] and we went in alphabetical order, my name was Krásová, beginning with K, so I only went on January 5th." – „So for you the whole change of régime was just an amnesty?“ – „Well, for us it really was.”

  • “Well, I was running to my friends, I was hiding at the station and everywhere possible and I started to like it. I tried booze, of course… So, to this day, I am kept as an alcoholic, even though I no longer drink since 2017, I have a job, I have everything… The booze is a motivation… And the freedom. It attracted me. So I got into a children's home in Kostomlaty pod Milesovkou.”

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    Praha, 03.04.2019

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It is possible to get out of the street, but you need a helping hand

She was born on 1st December 1967 in Rakovník as Ivana Krásová. When she was six years old, the family moved from Křivoklát to Prague. The family environment was very unhealthy, the mother drank and her father beat her; there was probably also sexual abuse. From the age of thirteen she was running away from home and after some time she was placed in the educational institution in Kostomlaty pod Milesovkou. After returning to Prague she started to live practically out on the street. She slept at the central station, hiding from the police in the underground channels. She was repeatedly imprisoned for theft, hooliganism or parasitism, at the age of nineteen it happened for the first time. She continued this way of life after the fall of communism. Several years ago, she overcame her addiction to alcohol, joined the Pragulic social project, got married and found permanent work and housing.